


Sinking Not Drowning

by Madzie



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Human, As per usual Jace is always a Lightwood in my stories, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Mentions of past abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-09
Updated: 2017-07-09
Packaged: 2018-11-30 02:04:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11453688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Madzie/pseuds/Madzie
Summary: “You’re amazing—Ah, erm your speech…It’s amazing. You’re gunna do fantastic.”“You think?” Simon’s smile radiates everything Jace wishes he had. He’s warmth, and beauty, and brightness through every layer, all rolled up into one perfect package. Jace thinks it was a daft mistake that Simon’s still here—friends with him—but a selfish, self indulgent part of him relishes that he is.





	Sinking Not Drowning

On their first day of junior High, Robert sat Jace and Alec down as a nursing Maryse watched over an excitable Izzy picking out her first day outfit.

“You’re both men now,” he intoned, eyes flickering over both his sons—one whom had inherited all his striking angles, and dark mop of hair, and then Jace. The orphan he and Maryse had adopted only a few years prior. Jace who sometimes finds himself staring at the mirror in his room, cursing his fair hair and mismatched eyes. Cursing the painfully physical reminder that he’ll never truly be considered a Lightwood, that he’ll always be the boy who disappointed his birth father over and over again. The boy who had his falcon murdered because he has no idea how to divide love from subserviency. The boy who was so unwanted that his mother died while giving birth to him, and who his father despised ever since.

Jace will always be marred with the title of Wayland—never a Lightwood.

“You boys need to take care of each other and your baby sister and brother.”

“I know that dad,” Alec sniffed with an imperious tilt of his dark head.

“Alright, alright, no harm in the reminder Alexander. I just want you both to keep on being true, alright? Always remember that strength is not found in the force behind our fists, but the dignity of our character. Right?”

“So much for we break noses and accept the consequences,” Alec snorts before their father playfully grinds his knuckles into his scalp.

Jace forces himself to laugh, and pretends that he didn’t see the sheen in Robert’s eyes that he and Maryse always seem to get whenever they so much as glide over Jace’s less than pristine past, a past of abuse and neglect by his birth parent.

 

~*~

 

Simon Lewis is everything bombastic effervescence, and cheeky grins that rival the incandescent rays of light that dance over his chocolate eyes, and make them sparkle in a way that snatches the breath right from Jace’s lungs.

Jace thinks that he might be slightly fucked when their teacher swings off the year by conducting one of the arbitrary, ice breakers that they always seem to be forced into, and Jace is partnered with sunlight personified.

“My favorite color’s blue, my favorite superhero is Spider-man, cause duh, and baseball ’s the best and only sport that I’ll actually sit down and watch.” Simon crows without even a breath between words just as soon as Jace plops down in front of him in the small desk—forcing their knees to brush up against each other every few minutes or so.

“Baseball? Like the slowest sport in the history of ever?” Jace deadpans, brows craned and the corner of his mouth tugging up in a small smile.

“I like the atmosphere, and peanuts.” Simon sulks, his face scrunched up sourly—and honest, it should’ve been Jace’s first sign that Simon was it for him  when he found the expression cute over anything else.

“Yeah, well I like Italian food but you don’t see me embedding myself into the nearest mob.”

“M’kay, one I’m pretty sure that’s borderline offensive, and two totally not leveled playing fields. You’re comparing  a weekend at Fenway, to waking up with a dead horse nuzzling your neck.”

“I dunno,” Jace gives a one armed shrug. “Sounds pretty equal levels of terribleness too me.”

Simon’s eyes sharpen, impressed, and Jace can’t help the swell of pride in his chest over the development.

“I bet Peeta would not even try recruiting you.”

“Yeah, well they also end up killing thousands upon thousands of the animals they claim to be saving  on a yearly basis—can’t say that I’m too broken hearted over the thought. And hey, wasn’t your assumption that the mob actually slices up poor, defenseless horsies borderline offensive  towards their organization?”

Simon barks out a laugh, and Jace thinks he is in serious danger of drowning in the color of his irises.

 

~*~

 

They sit besides each other for the remainder of that year.

 

~*~

 

“And that is when the conquistadors first infiltrated the Mayan land,” professor Herondale intones, seemingly completely oblivious to how half her class is about to keel over in boredom at her Ken Berns like monotone.

Jace is jolted out of his daydreams of actually making the baseball team when a crumpled up piece of paper smacks him in the forehead.

He cuts a menacing snarl towards where Simon is dutifully sketching in his paper pad, the slightest of leers playing on the edges of his lips. Jace doesn’t open the ball for another five minutes, just to be contrary, and is rewarded by increasingly peeved off gestures Simon directs his way over Maia’s head, who in turn just sighs—long suffering—and lodges a pen to Jace’s temple.

“Fucking hell,” Jace rubs over the tender spot while reading Simon’s note.

More borderline offensive, Prof Herondale trying to pronounce Spanish names, or the Asian neighbor from Breakfast At Tiffanies?

Jace pretends he isn’t so totally giddy while he scrawls back a counter.

 

~*~

 

They’re not best friends, not really. Simon will always have the spindly redhead that he declares as his plutonic soulmate, and Jace would never bestow that title on anyone but Alec and all his surliness.

So no, Jace and Simon are most definitely not best friends…But sometimes Jace is convinced that they must be more than just ordinary friends too.

Simon’s the only person Jace wants to be around on the anniversary of his father’s death—The lightwoods are all always so unsure on how to act, whether to ignore it considering he’s a proven, abusive monster, or to try and bring up the idea of therapy to Jace once more. What they never seem to understand is that no matter all of that horrendous shit that Valentine had put Jace through, he was still his father. He made him spaghetti when he was sick, and bought him all the books he could ever want, and he was there (Which is sure a whole hell of a lot more than what most kids could say about their fathers.) So what if he wasn’t exactly a Robert Lightwood, or Adon Lewis—He was Jace’s dad.

Simon’s at least ignorant to the whole mess—he still sees Jace as some chill dude that he actually likes hanging out with, and not the broken boy that he had to save. It’s a nice feeling.

And for his part, Simon seems to search for only Jace’s company when he wants to string together his fantasies of the future. When he buoyantly explains his intentions of becoming a detective just like his father, because he loves solving riddles and helping the people who can’t help themselves.

Jace thinks he’s brilliant, but doesn’t tell Simon so, less it exposes his ever growing attraction.

 

~*~

 

Jace is listening to Simon recite the section of the Torah that he’s incorporated into his Bar Mitzvah’s speech, ready to help out if Simon forgets any words. But really, Jace’s much busier marveling over the round vowels and lyrical cadences of Simon’s voice speaking out loud the foreign words, over actually detecting him stammering over anything.

“You’re amazing—Ah, erm your speech…It’s amazing. You’re gunna do fantastic.”

“You think?” Simon’s smile radiates everything Jace wishes he had. He’s warmth, and beauty, and brightness through every layer, all rolled up into one perfect package. Jace thinks it was a daft mistake that Simon’s still here—friends with him—but a selfish, self indulgent part of him relishes that he is.

“Thanks for all your help goldilocks,” Simon squeezes Jace’s hand, and Jace swears his mind melts right out of his head.

They stand their for another moment—or hour—longer, until Jace cuffs to defuse the static in the air, before he does something really dumb, like kiss Simon.

“More borderline offensive, you fucking up your pronunciation or our parents trying to get everyone to do the Hokey Pokey?”

Simon shutters with a grimace. “Please no jokes, I still remember how my mom almost took out our neighbor’s eye during Beck’s ceremony while dancing the Macarena.”

Jace is pretty sure that he only genuinely laughs when with Simon.

 

~*~

 

Adon Lewis is tragically murdered a month before their junior year of high school by a drunk driver, and Jace has no idea how to even begin to translate those words to fact.

“But-But he’s a cop. He can’t just die from something so, so, mundane.” Jace argues back with an eerily hallow voice as a very sullen looking Maryse gently breaks the news to him.

“I know my love,” Maryse croons, running a gentle hand through his golden tresses. “It seems impossible, but we all must remember how fragile our lives are, how even someone as good and kind as Mr. lewis could be taken away without a single moment’s hesitation.”

Jace doesn’t know how to respond—he’s just empty. He feels empty.

Flashes of a smiling Mr. Lewis—when he’s picking Jace and Simon up from the arcade, or taking them to Yankee stadium, or just saying hello while he passes Jace and his family while on shift—run through Jace’s mind. But that’s only a moment before Jace’s every thought is consumed by Simon, and how Simon must be taking this. And just everything Simon, and how much Jace wishes he wasn’t such a chickenshit and could come up with the perfect thing to say like Alec, or be a warming presence like Izzy.

Jace wishes he ever deserved Simon’s friendship, wishes that he could be there as an emotional support for someone he cared about. Wishes he wasn’t still so broken himself.

“I’m headed to give my condolences to Elaine right now if you’d like to join me?”

Jace doesn’t hear himself say no as much as he just feels it in his bones—feels it that Simon would much rather have Clary or any other of his countless friends comfort him in his time of need over Jace and all his issues upon issues.

 

~*~

 

Jace’s baseball schedule  has been pushing him to his max all summer, so it’s really not that hard to pretend that he’s to busy to take time and actually look Simon in his eyes and tell him how much he wishes he had never experienced the death of a parent. How much Jace thinks Simon deserves to be happy always, and how much he hates the fucking universe for doing this to him, to them.

The ironic part is that the only reason Jace tried out for this team over the football one like Alec,  is so that Simon would actually want to hang out during his practices and not be completely bored out of his mind.

Jace tries not to focus on why it hurts him so bad that Simon isn’t out there, with all the other players’ significant others, and chides himself that Simon has always just been his friend.  
And probably not even that anymore because of the way Jace’s been acting, like the scared little boy his father always told him he was.

 

~*~

 

Their first day of junior year comes and goes in a blur.

Alec falls head over heels for resident new kid, and destined prom king, Magnus Bane, so Jace is gradually roped into more and more of their groups activities, and less and less of anything that has to do with Simon.

Somedays it feels like Jace’s heart is cracking, and that he’s drowning in an invisible pool that no one else can see.

 

He spots the very same exhaustion woven into Simon’s broad shoulders, and how even from across the room Jace could detect a waiver in his once easy going smiles.

“I don’t know Jace,” Clary sighs out with a roll of her eyes as she twists the dial of her lock. “He’s not exactly opening up these days.”

“So what? You know he’s suffering but you’re not doing anything about it!” Jace balks, indignant. “You’re suppose to be his best friend!”

“Hey! at least I’m trying to do something!” Clary grits back, fiery hair lashing in the space between them dangerously. “He use to say you were his best friend too, and what have you done to help him? Hell, have you even actually spoke to’m since Mr. Lewis died months ago? huh?”

Jace staggers back, at a loss for words and frightened by the steely glint in Clary’s blue eyes.

“You’re pathetic Lightwood.”

Jace really doesn’t think she’s wrong.

 

~*~

 

It’s not hard finding Simon when Jace’s actually trying to look.

He treads back through the winding woods outside the cities limits, towards a small alcove where they use to sit underneath the punched out stars stenciled into the sweeping skyline, and where Simon would prattle on about whatever has caught his attention for that sparing moment, and where Jace would count every shade of brown in his eyes, utterly convinced that he would always love Simon more than Simon could ever give back to Jace. (Jace is still positive in that conviction, but it’s not so scary anymore. It doesn’t make him feel like he’s drowning in emotions for him, just accepting and embracing them. Wearing his love and devotion to Simon like a badge of honor.)

It was somewhere safe.

The only other physical place that Jace had referenced to with that descriptor was the Lightwood manner, but he supposes that the locations really have nothing to do with it, but more that they were the two places he found most synonymous with the hand full of people in this world that he would give up his own life to make happy.

Jace Make sure that his presence will be known before he actually makes it to their spot, stepping on all the twigs he could find, so that if Simon really didn’t want to see him, he could just circumvent Jace by sneaking past through one of the other trails.

A knot loosens in his chest, and Jace let’s out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding when he finds a very subdued Simon still there, lounging on their log, inwardly praising the way the moon’s soft glow traces over his profile.

“Shitty fuck ups who can’t face one of their best friends for months, or Top 40 hits on the radio?” Jace kind of wants to cry at how Simon looks like he’s peering right through him, as if he couldn’t spare Jace even an ounce of his attention.

“What are you doing here?”

“I’m an asshole.”

“You say that like it’s a new revelation.”

Jace sighs through his nose, and tentatively takes a seat besides Simon—despising the wall of tension that’s built it’s way between them. “I wanted to come by a thousand different times,” Jace’s voice sounds so God damn vulnerable, the way it always has been around Simon, but this time Jace is actually afraid that Simon will break him.

“Then why now? Why were you able to come by now? Way past the time when I actually needed you,” he’s sounds spiteful—his words coded in ice and silver and emotions that Jace can’t even detect anymore—as if Simon were some other stranger on the streets, rather than probably the single most important person in his world.

“I’ve been watching you at school-“

“Developing some stocking tendencies since the last time we’ve spoken goldilocks?”

“No dumbass—Ah, I mean—I didn’t mean to call you a dumbass. I’m sorry, I just keep fucking this up.” Jace’s muddled apologies fall on deaf ears, instead Simon looks like he might just crack a rib at the completely innocuous term. Really, they’ve called each other that, and about a hundred other variants ever since they met, but he’s still laughing as if it’s completely implausible that Jace just said the curse.

“Adopted some insane habits since the last time we’ve spoken,” Jace snarks with a pointed glare once Simon’s guffaws have died down.

“Bro you really suck at this whole apologizing thing. Or you know, being a fucking friend when it counts.”

Jace’s face falls from the dubious flicker of hope that has dared to light itself in his chest. “I know—You deserve someone so much better.”

It takes another minute for Simon to register what Jace had said, which Jace could only see once a puzzled look fractures his face.

“Dude, what are you even talking about?”

“Simon, my dad died when I was ten—the Lightwood’s adopted me when I was eleven and I still don’t think I’m over it—I’m still so fucked up over it, and I hated that you were going through the same thing. And I couldn’t let my issues fuck you over too. I couldn’t tell you anything that’d make you feel better, because honestly I don’t think anything besides you and my family has made me feel better.” Jace doesn’t know where this all came from, but it’s like him unplugging just one bit has caused his words to sprout out like a reservoir, and he doesn’t know how to stop it.

“Dude! that’s fucking idiotic!” Simon chastises, cuffing Jace over the head. “I didn’t want you to tell me some bull shit platitude to make me feel better, because newsflash nothing you or anyone else  could’ve said would’ve made me feel better!”

“Then, wh-“

“I just wanted you dumb ass!”

Jace flushes, and his heart starts flapping like a hummingbirds wings. “Is that too late? You wanting me around in any capacity?”

“Hah,” Simon shakes his head in a distinctly fond exasperation before clasping hands with Jace like he had so long ago—it still makes Jace’s blood feel like molten lava, but this time he let’s himself sink into Simon’s eyes. “Yeah, I think sometimes wouldn’t be so bad.”

 

~*~

 

Things become easier for them after that.

Jace is open about his past and how he still feels like such an outsider within the perfect Lightwood clan, and Simon divulges to Jace how his mother has begun drinking again, and how Rebecca refuses to come back home for winter break over it.

Jace kisses Simon’s shoulder at the admission from where they’re lying face to face on Simon’s too small, twin sized bed, because they do that now. They’ve become much more liberal with wandering hands and soft kisses pressed on to places on their bodies—excluding their lips of course, and only for comfort—It’s nice if Jace is being at all honest.

It feels right.

Jace really isn’t surprised when on the night that Robert and Maryse sanctioned his permission to stay out late to go and cheer on Simon’s band playing a terrible time slot in one of the few 18 and over clubs around town, he was cornered.

“You’re going out with Simon, is that right?” Maryse asks with a kinked brow, as if she had not gone over Jace’s extended curfew a hundred times over—checking out the club for herself and even  talking with Simon’s bandmates about the safety concerns she has, (It was paralyzingly embarrassing if you were wondering.).

“Yeah, he wants some moral support.”

“Right, well, have fun won’t you?” Robert offers gruffly, taking intense interest with the coffee swirling around his mug.

“Ah, yeah…I will you guys wanted to talk about?” Jace is feeling increasingly more frightful over where this conversation may turn.

“Oh, yes, yes, THat’s all,” Maryse assures airily, with a flapping of her dandy hand. “Just Jace darling, you do understand that a love between a parent and child is not so arbitrary that it falters for the slightest diversion of the beaten down path. You understand that my love, yes?”

Jace’s throat closes up, and he’s not sure why.

“Son, when we say unconditional, we mean unconditional,” Robert presses, staring directly into Jace’s eyes now. “We know that you still see yourself as somewhat of an other in this household, and that kills a piece of me, but do know that your mother and I—We love you with all we have. You are our son as much as Alec or Max. No matter who you love, or what you decide to do in your life, we’re already so proud of you.”

Jace doesn’t notice he’s been crying until Maryse is gingerly sweeping away the salty droplets with the pad of her thumb, and then they both tangle him into an embrace. And Jace thinks that he actually might be a Lightwood after all.

“Ah—Am I interrupting something?”

“Oh no Simon dearest,” Maryse beams, slowly detangling herself from the two men.

“now take care of our boy, yeah?” Robert tacks on. “And no funny business.”

Simon’s face slackens, going white as a sheet.

“Ah yes sir, of course—Oh erm I mean of course to the first one. The second thing, point—that’s a definite no. I mean unless it was consensual and shit—And wow, I really need to get going and Jace really needed to make me stop talking like so long ago.”

“I’ll see you guys tomorrow morning,” Jace snickers teasingly Simon’s way before hauling him back out to his hideous Scooby-Doo van.

“Bro, you seriously could’ve cut me off so long ago! I sounded like such a fucking tool in front of your parents.

“They already like you,” Jace shrugs. “They find your rambling endearing.”

“OH, joy,” Simon sneers while starting the ignition. “You know just once, I’d like it if some parent saw me as a bad boy that they don’t want their kids hanging around. Just once, just for my ego.”

Jace can’t help but let out a snort at that ridiculous of a notion. 

“They were under the impression that this is a date I think.”

“And?” Simon needles without falter.

“And what?” Jace parrots dimly.

“And, if it were?” Simon clarifies, stretching his arm out on the head of Jace’s seat.

“The fuck it is,” Jace gripes crossly. Simon’s face looks a little stunned, and a whole lot terrified before Jace continues on talking. “Your ass needs to ask me out with actual words, and not just expect me to let you feel me up after you get to play rockstar for one night.”

Simon’s face brightens ten fold, and it’s a near replica of what his smiles use to be like before the shit storm that was their last year.

“But my dude, you would be such a fucking hot groupie!”

“I find that borderline offensive.”

~*~

Jace ends up letting Simon feel him up in the back seat—but only just till his curfew.

 

~*~

He doesn’t let himself drown in his own emotions anymore—silently yelling out for help—instead Jace sinks into them, understands them, and knows that Simon will be their to pull him back to the surface once he has.

**Author's Note:**

> Requested by a fake prompt meme on [Tumblr](http://madzielightbanes.tumblr.com)
> 
>  
> 
> Pretty pretty pease let me know what you thought!! It inspires me so so hard to continue on writing<3<3  
> Thank you so much sugar plums<3


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